


two for nero

by cexies



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-29
Updated: 2014-01-29
Packaged: 2018-01-10 10:44:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cexies/pseuds/cexies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>anonymous asked: terkri?, in which “we made out once but never spoke of it again” friends becomes casual make out buds</p>
</div>
            </blockquote>





	two for nero

The part Kankri likes most about teacher training is the marking. He likes to think that he’s good at listening to other’s opinions, but with essays you have no choice in whether you are good or not. Most of the time he finds himself disagreeing, but sadly points aren’t based on his own bias. Terezi makes a point to constantly remind him of this, as interested in the philosophy students as he is. He often reads them aloud to her, curious for her input which is almost always that they are liars who are just writing what the professor wants to hear.  _No one is that morally pure_ , she scoffs, and sometimes it feels like it’s not just the names on the top of the paper that she’s talking about. They spend a lot of time like this, finding empty classrooms and working on their own studies together. At first it was out of a difficulty to find friends, already mutually acquainted through family to be able to talk to one another, but now there’s a sense of actual companionship. They clash heads on a number of topics, and Terezi almost always has to prove him wrong about everything she can think of—but they both share passion, and Kankri finds someone as educated and passionate as Terezi is a rare thing that ought to be appreciated, especially in an institute of education.

Or at least, he thinks that applies when she's not acting like a five year old.

"Terezi please, I would appreciated not being distracted right now," Kankri repeats for what could be the hundredth time, eyes flickering back to the beginning of the sentence she’d pulled him away from finishing. Recently she’s more restless in their study sessions, focusing more on talking and flirting than working: a combination that is usual from her.

"I don’t even think you’re capable of being distracted—not unless it’s more paperwork," Terezi frowns, but it quickly merges into a cackle with something she’s found amusement in, which seems to be a recurring theme. Whether she is interested in him as a person or a toy is something Kankri still can’t get his head around.

"That’s the sign of a healthy student."

"I think you are just naturally boring: a fact of life that cannot be helped—like how lemons contain more sugar than strawberries," she hums, fingers tapping on the table to a rhythm that he doesn’t know. "Even I know how to keep my grades up and have fun." Kankri curls at her dismissal, considering them close enough friends for such words to justifiably agitate him. In hindsight, he supposes that’s the point of her rifling through his personality in the first place.

"I’m not boring: just studious—which is a quality that shouldn’t be shamed. It may be detrimental if a person is reliant upon school work, but the culture of calling out those who believe in meritocracy and the education system is quite outdated considering current social and economic climates."

"Don’t you ever get bored of yourself: as in your whole do-no-wrong routine? Don’t you ever actually want to be yourself instead of this little wound up ball of political correctness? Lighten up," she sighs, fingers curling against the desk in agitation. Recently she’s grown fond of questioning everything he says, pushing and pulling until it takes all Kankri’s patience not to be baited into an argument. It isn’t as if he’s unaware of Terezi’s petulance for facades and lying, but her interest never seems to fall beyond gaining reactions—attempting to better people through her meddling is a strange turn of events.

"What exactly is your definition of ‘lighten up?’"

She pauses to think, smile quirking into somewhat of a smirk. It makes his breath hitch for reasons he doesn’t quite want to grasp, letting them evaporate as Terezi’s smirk drops into a chuckle. ”I don’t think you’d like my definition,” she smiles again, but it comes across as a leer more than anything.

"Haven’t we already spoken about making assumptions about the thought processes of others?" Kankri sighs in response, but his fingers tighten around his pen from her implication. It isn’t as if it’s too much of a stretch to make, considering the first semester has already been spent avoiding her flirtations like landmines.

She mumbles something before matching his previous sigh, quickly switching her posture into something akin to predatory. Kankri allows her to move closer, unmoving by telling himself that Terezi wouldn’t— _she isn’t going to_ —and if she does then there was nothing he could do to stop it. That totally explains why his eyes flutter shut as she leans forwards, pen marking across the paper as her lips meet his. There’s a moment where they’re both hesitant, as if they never expected the banter to manifest into something this tangible. Just as Kankri considers breaking it off, Terezi seems to resolve to do the opposite. Her hands move to the sides of this sweater, fingers wrapping around his frame in casual assertion of dominance and Kankri is suddenly painfully aware of his lack of experience, barely pressing back as his mind tries to process four hundred different things at once. He all but stutters with his mouth, coaxed by Terezi’s persistence to actually try. At least it’s not terrible when he does, able to finally pick up Terezi’s rhythm as his lips move against hers—attention drawn to the subtlety of his sweater tightening under her grip. Each movement seems to gain with force: lips barely brushing suddenly slide against one another: closed kisses turn to open. It moves too fast for him, but too slow at the same time. All Kankri can focus on is the warmth of her breath, the imprints her bony fingers leave and the pressure upon himself not to make noise. 

Eventually he runs out of breath, unable to multitask to the extent that Terezi apparently can. He pulls back with a flounder, completely unsophisticated in comparison to how Terezi pulls back and appears to watch him with mild interest. Even if she looks complacent, Kankri can see that her face is flushed too, hands only remembering to let go of him as an afterthought. They sit in an unnatural silence, awkward but yet somehow promising—as if there is a moment they’re leading up to. Dismissing the thought entirely: there is no way he can kiss her— _no way Terezi can kiss him,_ he corrects _—_ again _._  Kankri’s eyes dart from Terezi to behind her, face quickly ducking down at the floor until she slowly moves back into her seat. He’s spent years mastering a wall of chastity, and it has become a status that he didn’t intend to let slip so easily. He quickly scrambles to label the moment a mistake, pulling his chair closer to the table and resuming whatever it was he was doing before with his attention as far away from the woman next to him as possible. 

_Marking essays_ , Kankri reminds himself with confusion as his tongue idly sweeps where Terezi was.

\- - -

Two months pass with no mention of what happened, and Kankri tells himself that he’s grateful for it. It was a lapse of judgement on both their halves, and worrying about the whole affair was making it difficult to focus on the purely platonic relationship they share through a mutual respect of higher education and political debates. At least it’s purely platonic if he ignores her flirtations, which are certainly persistent but not reciprocated. At all.

\- - -

Three months finally pass until Kankri is reminded of their ‘incident’—at least he tells himself it’s the first time he’s remembered, instead of the actual reality where Terezi can’t breathe in the same space without him thinking of how nice it felt when her hands were curled into his sweater and her mouth was warm against his.

She wants help reading a professor’s chicken scratch handwriting, leaning over Kankri’s shoulder as he points at each word. It occurs to him that the letters are big enough for Terezi to read as she kisses him again, and he finds himself returning her actions with as much skill as he remembers from the first time. Those skills seem to be poor as Terezi tells him he isn’t great at it, but it’s okay: like all things he just needs practice.

They practice for another month.

\- - - 

Every day seems to slip into a routine: wake up, get ready, go to class, either practise teaching or sit in on a lesson, take papers to mark or pages to read, find empty classroom, study, act nonchalant as Terezi turns up, act even more nonchalant as they make out, act indifferent as they depart, spend the rest of the evening re-evaluating life or sexuality or friendships or Terezi and then eventually sleep. Rinse. Repeat.

\- - -

Eventually the cycle becomes so ingrained that Kankri stops questioning it. It’s ridiculous to ignore what they’re doing, but maybe friends can platonically enjoy kissing without it having to mean anything. Maybe he hasn’t broken his own rules—maybe it doesn’t count because she’s instigating it. Maybe it doesn’t count because she acts like it doesn’t count. Maybe it doesn’t count because he is just as much a manipulator as she is, warping the truth around him until it fits how he wants it to. Regardless of the how’s and why’s—especially the ones that make him look bad—their meetings are things that happen, and as long as they happen platonically than Kankri can stay at ease with himself.

But it’s when she sits next to him, actually studying for once and paying more attention to her books than she is to him—that’s when he gets antsy: impatient and curious for when and if she’ll focus on him again. He can’t allow himself to believe that he wants this, and it even frustrates him. A man above such impulses shouldn’t suddenly be at their mercy.

"What’s up with you Mr. Sourpuss?" She eventually frowns, looking up from her work and at him. He isn’t sure what to respond with, because in all honesty he doesn’t know himself. Is his expression really that obvious? Can she read deeper than that? The thought leaves him unsettled, unsure of whether he’d like her making (accurate) assumptions about how he feels about this whole ‘thing’ they have going on. "Are you being a dumb baby?" Terezi sighs, getting out of her seat and moving the whole three inches until she’s hit the edge of the table—back sliding against it. Her thighs rest against his as they stand and sit respectively, and Kankri can only mutter a defense of his ‘not dumb baby’ status as he gives in and pushes his chair back slightly. It’s all the permission she needs to seat herself on his lap. He tilts his head to meet her lips in the most awful display of self-restraint the planet has ever seen. Part of him doesn’t care anymore, almost able to justify and normalize how often they do this. The other part seems to care too much, taking her attention and touches with what  _could_  be called enthusiasm if he really wanted to analyze himself: which he doesn’t.

She kisses him with demand, hungry for what she wants—and what she wants he is obliged to give. At least if he pretends to be doing it for her benefit then it isn’t as bad: she is simply a sexually charged and curious teenager, indulging in it will show her that the fuss is for nothing; she’ll grow bored and leave him alone as if it never happened. Apart from they’ve been doing this for a month and Terezi doesn’t seem bored yet, especially with the way her hips ‘casually’ roll in the most indecent way—so indecent that he can’t tell her to stop it, not yet anyway. Their kisses switch from small and playful to deeper and long, chests rising in falling in dysfunctional synchronization. Kankri knows her tongue is going to graze his teeth before she even starts the action, catching her off-guard as he flicks his own to meet hers. Predictably, she huffs a small breath against him, dropping her teeth over his tongue and then pulling them back. The fact he likes such a sensation is mortifying: but so is the thought of being caught with an actual student and it hasn’t dissuaded him thus far. She tugs on his lips, nipping and biting until her incisors can get purchase—he tries to mumble no, but she ignores him, cleanly slicing a small cut. 

Pain stings terribly, but Terezi is quick in soothing it. She licks away the droplets of blood before Kankri is even aware that they’ve formed: only able to notice as copper begins to add itself to the taste of her. It’s the kind of decadence that would have never crossed his mind before this—before Terezi. The fact he even knows how to reciprocate such movements is her fault too: a terrible influence who could be the face of corruption. His focus slips as he thinks and she notices, her hands running through the back of his hair and tugging at the nape. By now he knows that she’s tousling it on purpose—either to annoy him or to risk getting caught, Kankri hasn’t quite worked out which yet. Still, having to fuss with his hair isn’t a terrible price to pay for the moments where Terezi’s nails drag through it, catching his skin until Kankri can feel goosebumps under the constricting heat of his sweater. They banter back and forth, using their lips for words and teeth for sarcasm. It still puzzles Kankri how he can be most familiar with her mouth, surer of the chap of her lips than he is his own. Maybe it’s the same for her too, always able to falter his breathing without thinking about it. Like when she pushes up against his chest, hands still tugging on his hair as she slides her tongue over his and sucks on it until his resolve falters—softly gasping into her mouth: and that’s it: she’s won.

"You can go back to what you were doing now," Terezi grins, pulling back and detangling her limbs from him as she cockily slips back into her seat: forever the cat that got the cream. Kankri doesn’t say anything in response, eyes falling away from her and back onto the paper in front of him. He carefully traces his tongue over the cut she’s left, grimacing at the texture but thankful it’s stopped bleeding. He knows he’ll do this for days, idly thinking back to this—to everytime before and every possible time it will happen again.  _At least things can’t get any worse,_ he offers himself, pen slowly resuming its earlier task while Terezi goes back to drumming her fingers against the table: a rhythm that Kankri is more than accustomed to.


End file.
